


When The Sun Hits

by koldtblod



Series: Mind Fields [2]
Category: Young Dracula (TV)
Genre: 2020 me is a relatively happy and upbeat person but I can't stop writing angst, Featuring the trope 'Adaptational Angst Upgrade', I went to uni because I thought it would make me happier but it made me more depressed vibes, I've tampered with the specifics of the mind-wipe b/c yeah, Light Angst, M/M, Memory Loss, Season/Series 05, This is canon up until is isn't anymore, This is not a unique concept, University Life, minor OCs - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:22:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26503594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/koldtblod/pseuds/koldtblod
Summary: There's a stranger at the party, and Robin's intrigued. But to say he's a stranger discounts Robin's gut feeling and perhaps for good reason.
Relationships: Robin Branagh/Vladimir Dracula
Series: Mind Fields [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1927489
Comments: 8
Kudos: 32





	1. Everything Is Scary

**Author's Note:**

> Anyway, it's almost October. Every year, I decide, hey, you know what's a great old TV show that I haven't watched in a while? Young Dracula! And so as a result, here I am, back on my bullshit. I'm 25 years old and in this fandom for the long run.
> 
> Fun fact, I wrote a big chunk of Chapter 1 a few years ago. It's the longer companion to my fic [Loveless](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12203163) (1298 words) and it's not entirely necessary that you read that first, as I consider them in the same universe but without following the same characterisations. If that makes sense. In short, Robin's gone to university, he's ended up with an accidental girlfriend called Veronica, but he can't stop dreaming about the face of some boy from years before and eventually, there's an amicable break-up.
> 
> This isn't a story about them.
> 
> Please enjoy. The title of the fic is a song from the album _Souvlaki_ by Slowdive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by German Error Message.

Robin has been fading in and out of the lecture for the past hour and a half. Today's movement: Dadaism, the works of Duchamp, Man Ray, and Hausmann. Robin hasn't slept very well – as if that's anything out of the ordinary – and so he's finding that his notes, whilst occasionally reflecting his ability to listen carefully and focus on important points, are only slowing on the page before him.

There's a guy in the back of the lecture hall tapping his feet.

A girl with her laptop three rows in front is typing manically, fingers a blur across the keyboard of her MacBook.

Robin clicks slowly but repeatedly at the top of his pen.

Their professor says,

"So, for this week's study, you might want to consider..."

And Robin drifts out of the explanation.

He's had a camera out on rent from the university stock room for just over a month now. At tops, he was supposed to have it for two weeks. Emails have kept appearing in his inbox whenever he signs onto the course computers, reminding at first that he's overdue on returning, and then gradually becoming more hostile. In the last one Robin had seen, earlier that afternoon, he'd noticed a fine had been added again to his account.

That's another thing he can't afford to pay for.

Quite like the packet of tobacco in his pocket that when his card had declined, Veronica had decided to add onto her purchase. Robin's mam is going to go berzerk. She'll worry herself silly and try to arrange a trip for the whole family, Ian, Paul and Chloe included, up to the city to dole Robin out of his problems.

The camera is still sitting innocuously beside the pile of Robin's shoes. It shouldn't be difficult to pick the damn thing up, just before he heads out the door, but no. Every time Robin gets up to leave his bedroom, the camera is always forgotten.

There's movement around him.

Robin shakes himself, snapping back to attention. The Powerpoint has vanished from the projector screen ahead and the other students are beginning to gossip and chat idly amongst themselves as they climb up from their seats, shouldering their bags, making enquires about dinner plans with friends. Robin jams his pen and his notebook back into his rucksack.

He hates being the last to leave the lecture.

November is coming to an end on campus and, quite unlike the promises in the adverts tacked to the sides of buildings and in the windows of Starbucks as he passes, is consumed not by the crisp of winter, but rather by the wet weather, miserable mornings, shortened afternoons and rotting brown leaves that stick to the ground in clumps thick enough to block up the drains. Robin has gone flying a couple of times right in front of the art building, unforgiving with its walls of glass, faces pressed against and laughing. He's very careful now as a result as he exits through the automatic doors and steps onto the pavement.

"Hey," shouts Veronica.

She's there, coming out of the union with another boy from her photography course, Pentax ME slung around her neck and tangled in her jewellery.

"We're going out tonight!"

"Great," says Robin, unenthusiastically.

There's a chill, damp breeze over the back of Robin's neck and pulling in Veronica's bright hair. She's determined, nevertheless, as usual to integrate him properly.

"Why don't you come?" the girl suggests. "Have a few drinks – a bit of a dance. Sarah's got a bag, I'm sure she'll share – "

"Look," says Robin, "thanks, but..."

"It isn't your thing."

"Not really," he says.

"Right," sighs Veronica, "nevermind! Well, we're having pre-drinks at the flat, and I want you _there_."

"I'll be in my room," says Robin.

He forces a smile. He wishes Veronica was by herself, so he could explain in a little more detail – you know I can't go to a club – but instead, there's this 6 ft 3 guy in Levi's and a designer jacket hovering over her shoulder, and the stare he's fixed on Robin is damn near terrifying.

Veronica runs in the widest of circles. She'd grown up in Cambridge, she has a bit too much money, and yet she's the closest thing he has to a real companion here. Any hopes of befriending the other Welsh boy on Robin's course had gone straight out of the window on the first day they met, after Robin had admitted without much grace that he'd never tried to learn Welsh, regardless of if that meant he had to communicate with his grandparents through a series of head movements and gestures.

Robin frowns, casting his eyes over the steely grey sky ahead. It's only 3 pm but the clouds are rolling in. It's going to be dark before he knows it. Robin doesn't have time to stand around in this conversation and also make it back before sunset.

"Think about it," says Veronica.

Her teeth drag back against her lip and she lets her hand slide down the length of Robin's arm as she pulls away. Robin stands quite still for a moment, watching her retreating back.

"He's so rude," the boy whispers.

A stage-whisper, laced with intention.

"Sssh!" Veronica hisses. "No, he isn't."

Robin doesn't care. He shrugs his bag up higher onto his shoulder and turns on his heel, heading for the bus stop. The ground is still damp from last night's rain and there are great puddles in the potholes and dips in the asphalt that Robin has to be careful of, standing far back, against the grubby glass of the shelter whenever a car passes too closely.

He could have been working for his dad instead this year, like Ian and Paul.

Robin could have given up his dreams, whatever was left of them, thrown out his art supplies and started donning a boiler suit every day of the week to submerge himself up to his elbows in other people's bathwater. He mightn't always enjoy university but in comparison to plumbing, it's practically a haven.

At least he's out of Stokely again, away from the towering remains of the castle on the hill that had burnt down a couple of years ago. He didn't know why, but Robin had suddenly started finding the old ruins a little too ominous for his liking.

He'd finished high school. He'd started college. He'd thought about quitting several times until discussions of university and moving away had started to crop up, and then he'd flung himself headfirst into a string of applications, of cover letters, of endless email admin and dear sir/madams at the top of every letter. Manchester Met had given him an unconditional on their Fine Art course.

Elizabeth Branagh had cried.

Robin had packed up his belongings and jumped on the train and thought that he'd never look back, but whatever had been haunting him for years at that point had decided to follow on after.

"Depression," said Chloe. "That's what it is."

But Robin isn't convinced.

He never goes to sleep without a nightlight. He's twenty years old now and in his second year of university, supposedly on his way to becoming a responsible adult, and yet Robin is afraid of the dark.

Always, in the corner of his eye, Robin is sure that something is watching him.

He's never had a name for it. That's what followed him from Stokely, he's certain; not depression, or agoraphobia, anxiety, or whatever his family had decided to call it. He can't place the shape that he saw sometimes outside of his window, nor really explain what he thought was waiting for him whenever the sun started to set. But something is there and Robin can't escape it.

Winter he dreads above all else.

Halloween has changed from one of, if not his favourite holiday, into a day shrouded with fear instead of excitement. There was a time when Robin used to love it – anything spooky and everything gothic. When he was 13, he knows without a doubt he used to be always at complete odds with the rest of his family, obsessed with vampires and ghouls and whatnot; and although he still is, it's now for quite different reasons. His mam still has photos of Robin dressed up in a cloak and fake fangs, and he's even got them on in his old school photos, but try as he might Robin can't remember when he stopped thinking that things like that were cool. He became scared, at some point, of the night and the things – whatever they were – that might be lurking in the darkness.

It's ridiculous, of course.

"He doesn't need a therapist," his mam had said, when he'd gone home for a weekend during his first year and Chloe had expressed her horror. "He just needs to put a bit of weight back on."

She'd spent half an hour tugging at the seams of Robin's jeans until they pulled tight around his legs again and patting down his shoulders so that she could work out whereabouts he began under the layers of dark plaid button-downs. She'd sent him back on the Sunday evening with a large Tupperware container full of homemade pie and a bar of chocolate for the journey, and both had been neglected in the corner of the fridge in favour of Lidl's cheapest scotch and badly hand-rolled cigarettes. Robin likes to stick to that diet quite a lot.

The latest batch he'd been sent back to Manchester with is likely still sitting there now.

He checks it out, when he gets in, and helps himself to a third of bolognese and then spends a long time staring at himself in the warped, twisted mirror on the wardrobe door in his bedroom. He's got a new haircut and a pair of Dr Martens and tries to carry himself with an air of fake confidence, but really he knows – underneath it all, he's still Robin Branagh.

And Robin Branagh doesn't know who he is.

He can't remember. He wants to blame the void inside him on the years of his life that have no memory; no soul to flesh them out; and to blame everyone around him for not knowing either.

Maybe that's selfish.

Maybe it's an idea to sketch out in charcoal and to submit as part of Robin's coursework for the deadline in a couple of months.

He decides to make a start on it early.

Robin's concentration is broken nevertheless a few hours later, as the first cries of welcome echo from the hallway. It's against his will that Veronica drags him into the kitchen, at quarter past ten when the flat is full of her friends and people that Robin vaguely recognises from the art building or the canteen. She pets the collar of the floral shirt that she's forced him into and giggles as she swings from his arm and leads him around.

"I don't know this song," Robin tells her.

Veronica may no longer be his girlfriend, but she's still got a habit. New boyfriend be damned, varied friends be damned, Robin's skinny legs and narrow shoulders are the perfect fit for her clothes, and now that Veronica has stopped parading him as her brooding boyfriend, she's started alternately to use him as an accessory.

In a way, she always has. That's the problem.

But at least she's supportive. Robin doubts that anyone else would be able to talk him out of his shell after a three-day isolated bender, and she's never questioned the reason behind their break up. Robin remains grateful.

She never laughs when Robin's at his worst.

"Everyone knows this song," Veronica says happily. "It's Mark Morrison's finest!"

Sarah staggers over eventually, through the throng of people, and Robin sees that already her jaw is swinging and her pupils are wide, and she grins disconcertingly up at him and Veronica as she waves her arms out towards them.

"I need you to meet someone," she shouts dramatically, chewing gum lolling from one side of her mouth to the other. "He's sooo nice!"

"Who?" asks Veronica.

"A boy!" cries Sarah.

Robin reaches for a beer. Sarah, too, has a habit of doing this. She's laughing now as she reaches back through the crowd and reappears with someone in her grasp, pushing him forwards into the circle. Robin's stomach gives an unexpected leap when the stranger raises his head.

"This is Vlad," Sarah tells them.

She thinks, as usual, that she's done it again.

"Vlad," repeats Robin.

And Vlad smiles with such warmth and familiarity as he shakes his hand, even though he's cold as ice, that Robin swears he's seen this boy somewhere before – he would bet on it. Vlad has a slim, pointed face and dazzling teeth and thick, brown hair that's been pushed back into a messy quiff. He's a little shorter than Robin, slim without taking on any of Robin's gauntness. He's exactly the type of boy that Sarah would go for.

"'Ave we met before?" Robin asks.

He's thinking, perhaps, one of Sarah's one night stands that everyone had conveniently forgotten.

Vlad shakes his head. "Not in memory," he tells him.

"Are you coming out?" asks Veronica.

She's been watching the exchange with an eager grin, amber eyes flitting invariably between the two boys and their interlocked hands. Robin drops his own to his side.

"Isn't he beautiful!" gushes Sarah, oblivious. She's squealing again as she clutches onto Vlad's waist and it's with cautious laughter that Vlad attempts to detangle her.

Robin catches a whiff of his aftershave and the cold night air.

"I don't think so," says Vlad. He's trying to hold Sarah at an arm's length. It takes a moment for Robin to realise he's addressing Veronica. "Only popping by, I guess."

"Another shut-in," nods Veronica, and she nudges Robin in the ribs. "Hey, like you."

"Suppose," says Robin.

He can't tear his eyes away from Vlad's enchanting smile.

"Right!"

Veronica squeezes his arm. Possibly it's supposed to mean something. She takes pity and, shaking her head gently, no, Sarah, stop, she takes hold of her friend instead and pulls her away, back into the centre of the room, casting a glance over her shoulder as she does so. Robin is suddenly acutely aware of Vlad's eyes on him too.

"I didn't get your name," says Vlad.

And Robin blanches, sticking out his hand again. "It's Robin," he says.

"I'll remember," Vlad tells him.

"Yeah..."

They've been left alone. Some guy from the flat upstairs is up on the coffee table now, shouting his song request, and Robin thinks he ought to do something. He clears his throat.

"D'you want a drink?" he asks, because Vlad's hands are empty and he's starting to fidget and Robin discerns that, at university, the surest way of making connections is to offer up alcohol.

Vlad laughs. "I – no, thanks," he says, "I can't."

"I've got scotch," Robin tries.

Nothing is appealing about the lukewarm beer that he's found himself drinking and really he wants any excuse to leave the kitchen again for a while. It's too busy. His cheeks are hot. Vlad's gaze is penetrating.

He's shaking his head.

"Show me your artwork," says Vlad, as if he understands.

Robin nods and leads the way.

He's left his dirty laundry strewn around the room, and there's the lingering scent of cigarettes and of Veronica's perfume in the air from when she'd come barging in earlier. Robin regrets both of these things as he opens the door, because he really doesn't _do_ home decor anymore and there's nothing on the walls to distract Vlad's attention. Instead, he hurriedly pushes the clothes from the bed and tries to kick the empty bottles that are gathered beside his desk discretely out of view.

"Sorry," he says, "I don't – "

"It's alright," Vlad tells him. "It's brilliant."

What an unusual turn of phrase.

As a peel of raucous laughter bursts from the kitchen, Robin lets the door fall shut behind him and feels his stomach turn. He doesn't usually let strangers into his room – Veronica in the first week of term had been only an outlier – but now here he is, with this all-too-familiar boy gazing around at the walls. Vlad is trying to find something to focus on other than the peeling paint and the laminated poster of no-smoking rules right above Robin's ashtray.

All the while Robin is forcing back the inexplicable urge to launch himself across the room and into the boy's arms.

For God's sake, thinks Robin, you've only just met him.

Hasn't he?

"I figured you'd have a lot more decorations," says Vlad pleasantly. "Posters, or something. At least, you don't strike me as a minimalist. And I know that isn't your shirt."

"Well," says Robin, with a quiet laugh, "you're right."

Vlad beams. He speaks with a lilt – Robin notices only now – or more accurately an inflection. It's European, thinks Robin, but from further afield than he's used to and also, only slightly, with a touch of Welsh, as if he'd grown up in two different places.

Robin wants to ask, but fears it's rude.

He pushes aside a stack of lectures notes on his desk to distract himself, fingers closing around the edge of his sketchbook. There are others scattered around somewhere, beneath his bed, up on the shelf, and including the one that Robin had been using earlier, but this is the biggest. It's tatty from its years of abuse.

"I know you," says Robin, handing it over, holding on tightly as Vlad's thumb brushes his. "I feel like I know you."

Vlad just smiles.

"Thanks," he says, and takes the sketchbook.

Robin holds his breath. Despite everything, if there is one thing that hasn't changed over the years, it's the nature of his artwork. At least not entirely. There are additions; new subjects that Robin has taken an interest in and learned to draw, like flora and day-to-day life, but always a constant, unchanging except for Robin's abilities, is the focus on demons.

Of monsters and vampires.

The things that Robin always felt were teetering on the cusp of his understanding. He isn't sure why.

His dad had expected him to grow out of it but somewhere along the lines, as Robin's love for everything dark had channelled into fear, he'd incorporated it too back into his art – bodies twisted, ripped open, bleeding out on the floor – hordes of zombies with creeping, decaying flesh swarming suburban houses – in-depth studies of vampire bats, of black widow spiders, of jaws of sharp teeth and obscure sketches of the dark figure that Robin is sure hovers outside his window at night.

Suddenly he realises that he doesn't want Vlad to see this. It's a little too raw and a little too open. Once upon a time he would have been proud and flaunted his delight but these days, no. It's terrifying. Robin's sketchbook is a dark tunnelled view direct to his brain and it isn't the type of thing to be shared at parties.

It's like walking into a crowded room, full of people, standing up on the table and announcing loudly,

_'I might be suicidal!'_

Robin balls his hands into fists at his side and wills himself not to move.

"D'you like this stuff?" asks Vlad, as he flips another page.

Staring him down is a watercoloured painting of a long, cloaked figure, in a waistcoat of red with midnight black hair, sitting on a wooden throne in a cold stone room. Vlad's gaze lingers, his eyebrows furrowing.

"No," says Robin, "they're just... in my head."

It feels too real to admit.

Vlad hums. He traces a finger over the detail on the cloak, then snatches his hand back as if he's been stung.

"I'm not a freak," says Robin quickly. "I dunno."

"It's fine," says Vlad.

But there's something in his voice. He keeps turning, page after page, and Robin has to look away. His heart is racing.

Then Vlad laughs, low and fond.

Robin looks up.

"Is she your girlfriend?" Vlad asks.

He's paused again on another portrait. This time it's Veronica, drawn from a photograph he has of her, taken on her old 35mm camera and smiling into the lens. She really is pretty and Robin wishes he could appreciate it in the ways that boys are supposed to. Back in their first year, she'd practically begged – 

"Draw me, draw me!"

– and upon seeing the finished product had featured quite heavily in Robin's sketchbook. Veronica is an ideal subject, Robin finds, with her textured curly hair and vibrantly patterned clothes, and willingness and confidence to pose whenever asked.

Vlad looks over the pages and smiles a little wistfully.

"Oh," says Robin, "no, she's just – we're – it isn't like that."

Vlad nods.

"Not anymore. I'm not really _into_ girls."

He doesn't know why he's saying it. In the end, Robin hadn't needed to come out to Veronica after their disaster of a relationship, but he's never expressed the reality out loud. He's never told his parents. Certainly not his brothers. Chloe would be far too understanding and try to give him advice, recommend self-help books and suggest he join the society at the university. Robin has never once uttered the words out loud to himself, not even in the mirror. But here he is, telling the stranger. He's telling this boy with the too-tight jeans and European-Welsh accent because he's oh-so-familiar and Robin just wants to feel a connection.

"Honestly," says Vlad, "I don't really blame you."

"What?"

"I have a big sister," he says, with a shrug. He's still flicking through the sketchbook, twisting it around to catch the different angles. "I've seen how she treats the men in her life."

Robin understands that he's supposed to laugh.

"You're good," says Vlad, handing it back. "You've really improved."

"I think I've regressed," says Robin. "When I was younger – "

But then he catches it. He's _improved_. Become better. Developed. If Vlad had never seen a piece of Robin's artwork before in his life, he would have said good, really impressed, really creative.

But he hadn't.

Specifically, he'd chosen the word improved.

Robin has stopped, motionless, with his arm still outstretched from taking the sketchbook and he's staring at Vlad who's unblinking and, somehow, suddenly equally as aware.

"Improved?" he repeats.

"I mean..." says Vlad. "That's not what I meant."

"No, it is!" says Robin. "I know it is. I told you I knew you. Where 'ave we met?"

"I better be going – "

"No!" says Robin.

But Vlad is on his feet.

"It's good to see you."

He's crossed the room in a matter of seconds and Robin desperately jumps up after him. He doesn't catch Vlad's arm before the fire door shuts again behind him and then, when Robin wrenches it back open, Vlad is completely gone. He isn't in the hallway. He isn't in the kitchen. Try as he may, Robin can't find the boy in the flat at all – not even in the bathroom or in Sarah's room (although he hadn't expected that anyway). When he asks Veronica, swaying and giggling up on the coffee table, all she does is laugh.

"Has he given you the slip?"

"It's not funny," says Robin. "We've met before, I swear it!"

"Yeah," says Veronica, "I bet you have."

Robin locks himself in his bedroom and that night he doesn't sleep a wink.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alexa, play Fear of the Dark by Iron Maiden.


	2. I'm Sorry About Yesterday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by Fox Academy.
> 
> Robin's gone to Man Met for uni because hometown represent and I know the art school like the back of my hand. There's also a big (sometimes pretentious) art crowd but unfortunately, the club night that I've based the likes of Veronica on has shut down this year and I miss it every Monday night come 11pm.

It's another week or so later when Robin is squeezed behind the blinds in his bedroom, cigarette in one hand and coffee cup in the other. It's a quarter past midnight, it's cold out, and Robin has his coat on and the collar pulled around his neck as he leans out of the open window.

There's an assignment due tomorrow, but his is only half-finished. He should have had the entire week to work on getting it completed, but Robin's mind has been elsewhere. He's had a lot of dreams, mainly in the late afternoons. That's really the only time he's been sleeping, exhausted, after lectures. He's skipped a couple of those as well.

"Yes," he'd lied, when on Thursday evening he'd received the customary phone call from his parents, "I'm eatin'... Mam, don't go on... No, they won't suspend me."

There are exactly seven more drawings in Robin's sketchbook. There's also an ugly brown stain spreading across a number of the pages, where one night he'd been careless and knocked the bottle of scotch over with his foot.

The drawings are all of Vlad.

Outside, below in the courtyard, someone is moving around. They've been out there for at least half an hour, and Robin has been watching, wondering why if they're a resident they haven't given up and gone back inside. Anyone with a key, he thinks, would have made the move. He can only see a vague outline, because whoever it is has been keeping out of floodlights. They're also dressed all in black.

Robin has been awake for almost 38 hours, and after spending so long huddled beside the window he's starting to feel reckless.

His tutors have already decided that he'll fail the year.

There isn't much left to lose.

Fear is prickling across the back of his neck yet still, Robin takes a final drag of his cigarette – his fifth, no less, in a row – before flinging the end out of the window. He jams his feet clumsily into his boots and grabs the key for his room, not locking it behind him, and also the now empty bottle of scotch from the bedside table. Just in case.

He doesn't know who he's expecting, or what.

A part of him wants to confront his fears, to prove to himself that there's nothing out of the ordinary waiting in the darkness, and another, possibly larger, just wants to get it over and done with. Worst case scenario, the person in the courtyard is an intruder. They beat him to death and leave his body, and he's found tomorrow morning covered in frost and iced blood and someone is assigned the thankless task of calling his parents. Best case scenario, it's one of the other art students. They're drunk or high, have lost their key, and Robin has to make a guess from which block they belong to and escort them safely home.

Another piece of him is wishing for a fight.

At the bottom of the stairs, in the hallway, Robin braces himself steadily at the doorway. His mobile is tucked into the back pocket of his jeans, easy pickings for any opportunists, but also an easy grab if he needs it; if any semblance of survival should come to him as he's lying face down in the gravel. He thinks he might be ready.

Light spills out into the courtyard as he opens the door and out of the corner of his eye, Robin catches the dark silhouette of something moving very quickly, way back behind the picnic tables, behind the oak tree, out of sight. Not wanting to be seen. He grips the neck of the scotch bottle firmly in his hand as he steps forward and creeps, as silently as possible, across the gravel.  **** Dr Martens aren't very forgiving, and the night – except for a distant party that seems to be happening two buildings away – is very quiet.

Robin's blood is thumping in his ears. He draws his shoulders back tightly and raises his hand, preparing to strike, as he ducks around the tree trunk.

"Whoa!" comes the cry.

Robin drops the bottle. He stumbles a couple of steps backwards in surprise and luckily catches himself, before he can fall, feeling his heart in his throat as he gapes.

"It's you!" he yelps.

"What are you doing?" Vlad hisses.

"Could ask you the same!"

Vlad lets out a long sigh, pressing his hand over his mouth momentarily before he starts laughing. He sounds relieved. Robin pulls himself straight and glowers, justified in annoyance.

"What's so funny? You've been out 'ere for ages! Was that you?"

"What?" says Vlad. "I was checking in."

"It's like 1 am!"

"I left in a rush, last weekend."

" _ What? _ "

Robin's jaw hits the floor for the second time. His cheeks have flushed hot even as the air presses in cold around him, and Vlad's still laughing; he's got an infuriating smirk on his face as if Robin was just the person he was hoping would come and seek him out, try to attack him, or whatever.

"At the party," says Vlad. "I wanted to say I'm sorry."

"It's 1 am," repeats Robin.

"You're still awake," says Vlad.

"So you're sneakin' around? You 'eard of a doorbell, mobile phone, anythin'? Fuck."

Robin shakes his head. Vlad clears his throat, quelling his amusement. He sobers up quickly enough at Robin's unwavering scowl.

"I'm sorry," he says again, more seriously.

"Yeah," mumbles Robin. Then he looks away. This is what he'd been hoping for – a second chance – and he's blowing it fast. "Uh, look," he tries, "you scared me, I guess. Can see you movin' around down 'ere from my room and... I dunno, just thought it was creepy."

"You don't like creepy?" asks Vlad.

"Not anymore," says Robin. "Am not a kid."

He stuffs his hands into his jean pockets. He can feel the keys cutting bluntly against his fingers.

"Aren't you cold?" he asks.

Vlad doesn't seem to be wearing much except for an open leather jacket and pants and a thin grey t-shirt. If he'd had longer hair, Robin might have mistaken him for one of the rock stars that Veronica liked to fawn over. But Vlad simply shrugs.

"I'm alright," he says.

Robin nods. Vlad stares. Robin has the feeling that Vlad wants him to say something.

"D'you... wanna come in?" he offers.

It's the correct suggestion.

A few minutes later, Robin is pushing his way back into his room and regretting once again his lack of motivation to clean up after himself. The camera is still there, gathering dust, on the floor.

"Much warmer," says Vlad, with the air of someone trying to remember how to communicate normally.

Robin frowns.

"Is it?" he asks.

It's freezing in the halls in winter. Robin's heater had conked out three weeks ago, and since then he's had to make do with the heat from the lightbulbs and layering up with more jumpers and shirts.

"Maybe not," says Vlad.

His expression mirrors one of being caught in a lie.

"Okay then..." says Robin.

He pulls the window closed and draws the blinds tight again. Behind him, Vlad settles on the edge of the bed.

"'Ow did you know," asks Robin, into the silence, "that I drew?"

Vlad raises his eyebrows.

"You're all art students," he says, as if it's obvious. "This building, just full of them. The girl who dragged me in, what was her name? – Sarah – she said something like, ooh, you look the type. It's a reasonable assumption."

"Right," says Robin, "but it wasn't just a guess."

"What'd you mean?"

"When you saw my drawings – " Robin begins.

Vlad lets out a groan.

"Why don't," he says, "now that you've got me, we stop asking questions? Do something, I don't know, fun."

"I've got an assignment," says Robin.

"And you spent so long watching me downstairs," says Vlad. "Yeah, right."

"I do," Robin tells him indignantly.

But in truth, the closest he'd come to actually working that evening was deciding to pull open his laptop and Wikipedia Surrealism. It must be written all over his face, because Vlad's mouth cocks into a smirk.

"Fine," says Robin. "What d'you wanna do?"

Of all things, they play chess.

Robin used to be brilliant, his parents remind him of this. Upon the move to Manchester, perhaps hoping he'd find comfort enough to want to play it again, he'd packed his old kit – a present from Chloe, worth far more than her weekly pocket money and deserving of a Best Little Sister award. But Robin is out of practice. His eyes are heavy with exhaustion although he still isn't ready to sleep, and he messes up on several moves and loses to Vlad three games in a row.

Vlad doesn't drink. He declines when asked if he's hungry at all and simply watches as Robin leans back out of the window for another cigarette. A movie, they'd decided, was also out of the question.

A conflict of interest, Robin concluded.

And Vlad had agreed.

Vlad had looked around again at the boxy little room, eyes landing on the wardrobe and there, on top, the abandoned chess set.

"Aw, wicked!" he'd said, which wasn't a reaction Robin was used to hearing in response to the suggestion.

Vlad had set up the board, natural as anything, on the edge of Robin's bed and didn't have to say a word to prove he was excited. For someone who claimed to only just have met Robin, he sure seemed comfortable.

Robin tries for the most part not to enquire, but eventually, somewhere mid-way through their fourth game – twenty-five past three, reads the clock on the wall – he caves.

Vlad has moved a knight with conscious precision.

"Why are you awake?" Robin asks him. "And why are you 'ere?"

"Why are you?" retorts Vlad.

He, unlike Robin, doesn't look unrested. He's pale without colour but his cheeks are full and his eyes without bags.

Robin snickers.

"Fair play," he says. "Don't call me out, not in my room."

"Alright," says Vlad.

He's smiling too and fuck, is Robin's in trouble. It could be the sleep deprivation, but he'd thought even in the fluorescent light of the kitchen at the party that Vlad was something to look at, and now Robin can't help it. He seems almost ageless. There's the boyish charm in the grin on Vlad's face and the effortless soft curl of his hair against his forehead and Robin, in comparison, looks a hot mess. Everything about him is a little too greasy to disguise and Robin knows, undoubtedly, that he smells like cigarette smoke and week old BO.

"But really," he says, suddenly self-conscious, "why're you 'ere? Don't you... y'know, have somewhere to be? A bed to sleep in?"

"I'm kinda my own boss," says Vlad, with a shrug. "I can leave, if you want. You look kinda tired."

"No," says Robin.

He might never see Vlad again. Still, the other boy refuses to tell the reason behind his creeping around in the courtyard or why here, why Robin, and why now.

But he's looking around, as if guilty, over the mess of Robin's room; the notebooks on the floor, the dirty laundry, the debris of crisp packets and beer bottles. Notably, Vlad's eyes linger on the nightlight plugged in beside Robin's bedframe. He licks his lips, slow and unconscious, as if trying to come up with a suitable response.

"If I tell you something," he tries, eventually, "will you promise not to question it?"

"Yeah," says Robin.

It's automatic. He can't make a promise but he craves another clue.

"I know you don't sleep much," says Vlad.

His words are chosen carefully. He eventually looks back.

"But I think you should try to now. Just for a while. I don't have to leave, not until morning, but... Robin, you're exhausted."

Robin's lip throbs beneath his teeth.

Anyone could see that. These days, it's more common for him to feel like he's a sniff of lavender away from passing out, but he nods regardless, wordless, and moves the chess set away from the bed. He isn't sure what else to do. Robin stands, still for a moment, in the middle of the room, debating taking off his jeans so he might actually get comfortable. For the first time, it seems as if Vlad is also struggling with where to put himself.

In the end, Robin lies down. He's still fully clothed and on top of the duvet when he reaches to pull at the light-string above his bed and plunges the room in darkness.

He doesn't like it. His pulse thrums wildly beneath the skin of his wrist and he hears Vlad sniff and shift back against the wall. Robin can just make out the figure at the end of the bed, propped with his knee against his chest, and Robin gets the sudden idea that Vlad can still see him. He clamps his eyes instantly shut.

He used to enjoy this, he tells himself, over and over – blackout curtains in his bedroom and a pillowcase shoved beneath the crack of the door. He used to sleep at normal hours and eat breakfast and not smoke or drink to knock him out, but he's trying, god damn it, he's trying to impress the near-stranger by keeping the nightlight off.

Vlad's hand closes over Robin's calf.

There's a moment of panic, and then his mind goes blank.


	3. Who Cares If You Exist

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by Peacock Affect.
> 
> In the tags I've said that this fic is canon up until it isn't. By that, I mean simply that with everything that happened, it never sat right with me that Vlad mentioned Robin once in S3 (and also as an afterthought in S5) and then just promptly forgot about his existence. I really think that it would have left more of a scar.
> 
> Anyway. Now it's October, I'm feeling spooky and I hope you enjoy this chapter.

Somehow, and it's a mystery, Robin wakes beneath his duvet almost three days later, to dreary grey sunlight filtering through the gap in the curtain. It's early afternoon, just past noon, on the first Wednesday of December, and the rooms around are quiet save for the buzz of a hoover in the flat upstairs.

He's missed the deadline for his assignment, that's for sure. Robin has to double-check online and with a text to his sister to ensure he isn't hallucinating, or imaging things, but the confirmation comes back.

 _'Yes, it's Wednesday,'_ texts Chloe, and Robin can hear the reserve in her tone through the words alone. _'Robin, are you okay? Do we need to come up?'_

 _'No,'_ Robin tells her. _'I think I'm alright.'_

He emails the professor. He makes up some bullshit excuse and asks for an extension and tells Veronica, when she asks, coming back from her lecture, that there'd been a family emergency and he'd simply been away, not sleeping, since she last had seen him.

Veronica takes it in, believes one way or another. She invites Robin to the Christmas Markets, whilst it's still light, and he thinks she must be shocked when he actually says yes.

It's a temporary solution, decides Robin in the end.

He's been passed out cold for the worst of the week and although it hasn't solved any problems, it's definitely encouraged an appetite. Robin stands with his back to the wall, huddled beside Veronica, beneath the awning for the chestnut stand, and tries not to wonder what had happened to Vlad as he eats his way through a bag.

He even takes a shower. It's something of a feat. Only upon rinsing the shampoo through his hair not once, twice but three times does Robin truly appreciate just how filthy he'd allowed himself to get. He takes the razor to the scruffy smattering of hair that's grown over his chin, towels himself off and puts on deodorant. Sarah jokes, when she sees him in the kitchen, about actually making an effort.

"I don't 'ave a date," Robin tells her with a laugh. "I've just 'ad a shower."

"I have eyes," she says, "duh!"

Robin rolls his own. He forces the washing machine door closed against his mass of dirty bedding, stray sock worn five times over just managing to creep into the load, and opens the fridge in search of the milk. He must be feeling better, because he makes everyone in the flat a cup of tea – getting the sugars wrong, of course.

"Some guy's been 'round for you," says Tom, when he takes his mug from Robin's hands.

"Oh?" says Robin.

"Yeah, weird name; weird sorta bloke."

"Is it Vlad?" asks Robin.

Sarah starts to giggle.

"That's the one," agrees Tom. "Thanks for that, Robs, just enough milk."

"But wait – when was this?"

"Yesterday night," says Tom. He sips at the tea, pulling a face of approval. "Came back from football. He's wandering around in the courtyard like some kinda vampire! Had to tell him we hadn't seen you."

"Right," says Robin. "Is he gunna come back?"

But Tom is already retreating.

"Dunno," he calls, over his shoulder. "Maybe he's there now!"

He isn't, in fact, anywhere to be seen. Robin races back to his bedroom, his stripped bare mattress stark and white against the backdrop of mess, and flings open his blinds so that he can stare down below. Across the courtyard, in the adjoining set of flats, there's a gaggle of girls all smoking out of the same bedroom window, giggling vicariously, and somewhere above them, a shirtless man lifting weights. The ground floor is quiet. A pigeon is trying to settle in the oak tree.

Robin convinces himself that Vlad will be back.

It can't be a coincidence, he thinks, that Vlad has returned to the building. There must be a reason he's singled Robin out, and Robin wants without question to get to the bottom of it.

As it happens, he doesn't have long to wait.

On Saturday evening, there's a knock on his door. Robin is wearing clean jogger bottoms and a t-shirt he's had for so many years that somehow still fits him. 'Korn' in violent red letters is printed across the front, along with a picture of a skeleton sticking needles into a voodoo doll. His dad had never been fond of it and Robin's Linkin Park t-shirt in a similar style had been lost to the ages.

He looks up from his sketchpad. His fingers are covered with charcoal and the wings of a bat are almost fully formed on the page before him.

"What?" shouts Robin.

Vlad's hair proceeds him through the door. His smile warms Robin from the inside out, as does the offering of junk food in his hands.

"Morning," he says, almost a joke.

Robin grins.

"Sarah let me in."

"She fancies you, y'know," says Robin.

"Yeah..." Vlad laughs. "I can tell."

"Come in, sit down."

"You look better," Vlad tells him. He throws the bag of Malteasers and Haribo down onto the bed ahead of him, then the Doritos from under his arm. "D'you feel it?"

"Yeah," says Robin, "sort of. What's all this?"

"Grey skin doesn't suit you," says Vlad. He slides beside Robin without waiting for further invitation. "Oh, man, that's amazing!"

"You takin' the piss?" asks Robin.

He turns his head. If Vlad had been any closer, their noses would have collided but Vlad doesn't retreat. He nudges Robin in the shoulder and jostles him lightly.

"Serious," he says. "I can't draw for crypt nor coffin."

Robin accepts the compliment and lifts himself up, tucking the sketchpad safely away on the shelf above him. He resists the urge to wipe his fingers down against the soft grey of his joggers, settling instead for the baby wipe that Veronica had been using earlier. She'd applied it to the already pristine wing of her eyeliner, peering into Robin's warped mirror, and when she'd decided it was finally perfect had chucked the wipe down onto the desk and left to meet her boyfriend with a blow of a kiss.

Robin's glad, this time, that his room is more presentable. The same goes for Robin himself. He crawls back beside Vlad against the wall and doesn't worry about whether he smells.

They see a lot more of each other.

Robin's parents start inquiring about what he wants for Christmas, when he's coming home, and Robin is tempted to ask for hypnotherapy to cure his fear of the dark and also to forgo the holiday entirely, and stay in the halls with Vlad. Vlad never says where he's come from. He changes the subject whenever Robin urges to know why he's here, hanging out with uni students, when for sure he's out of education.

"I work nights," is the most Robin gets. "No one else does."

And he settles for the explanation, for the time.

The winter is still fucking awful; nothing changes Robin's mind about that. What he dreads the most are the late afternoon lectures and seminars, commonly commencing at around four in the afternoon and running until the night has truly fallen in outside. On a couple of occasions, Robin doesn't even find the strength to catch the bus home. Instead, he walks from the art building over towards the library, eyes on the floor, fists curled around the straps of his bag, and hides between the bookshelves until sunrise the next morning. It's a 24-hour library, the lights are never shut off, and Robin only feels the need to glance over his shoulder when he dares a trip to the toilets. The stark white corridors leading up to the boys' room are always deserted and echoey, and the pipes gurgle and splutter behind the walls when Robin presses the flush.

When the flat decides to have a movie night, watching Krampus, Robin locks himself in his room. He can hear the fake screams and overly dramatic horror music reverberating through the walls even there, and he presses his head beneath his pillow until stars are dancing before his eyes and he's hyperventilating, unable to breathe.

He's sure he used to be braver than this.

He can't imagine any boy who was so thoroughly obsessed with all things goth, as he had been, being quite so afraid of things that went bump in the night. But here he is.

Robin calls home, at quarter to midnight. His dad's voice is gruff with sleep when he answers.

"Robin?"

"Ooh," he hears from his mam in the background, "what time is it?"

"I thought we'd got to the end of all this, son."

"Would you tell me," says Robin, quickly, without apology, "if somethin' traumatic 'ad 'appened when I was younger?"

"What?" asks Graham. "Robin –"

"Hand me the phone," says Elizabeth.

She yawns as she takes the receiver. Robin can imagine her wiping sleep from her eyes, rearranging her long white nightdress as she sits up in bed.

"What's this about?"

"I just –" Robin begins.

Suddenly he doesn't want to bother her. Knowing his mam, she'll start to panic. She'll try to push her husband into the car in the early hours of the morning and appear at the student halls in a flap, waking the rest of the flat, and then she'll refuse to leave until Robin comes with her or she's cooked up about fifty meals for him. Either way, he'll never hear the end. The last time Robin had attempted to express his feelings, really talk about what he was going through, they'd started discussing the possibility of taking him out of university.

Back to the family business.

Therapy, no, that wasn't the answer. But home-cooked meals, family bonding time, and taking up a sport were the things that without a doubt would improve Robin's mental health.

"I think there's somethin' wrong with me," he says, with difficulty.

"Ohh, love," Elizabeth coos. "I was wondering when you'd tell us."

"What?" breathes Robin.

"Graham," says his mam, "go and make a cup of tea!"

She's trying to get rid of him. There's a grunt from Robin's dad and the bedsheets are rustling, and then Elizabeth turns back to the phone.

"You mustn't think that," she says. "It's quite common these days, isn't it? You know Ieuan from down the road? He's moved in with Mark Griffin who works over in Llanelli now."

"What?" says Robin again.

"And it's always the youngest boy – I've read up on it, you know!"

"Mam," says Robin, "what are you on about?"

"There's nothing wrong with being gay," says Elizabeth.

Robin's heart misses a beat. He goes quiet, barely daring to move; he doesn't respond.

"Robin?" asks Elizabeth, concerned, over the line.

"Yeah..." says Robin eventually. "That's it."

She's missed the mark, sure, but maybe there's a time for everything. Elizabeth isn't right, but then again she isn't exactly wrong either. Robin doesn't think he fits the mould. He doesn't dress gay, so to speak; he doesn't care for drag queens and the gaggle of students in his year who had moved out to share a house together, at the end of last term, always seem to be arranging socials to which half the city is invited. Not exactly his scene.

Maybe, thinks Robin, he never introduced his parents to Veronica when they were still together (as if it had mattered), and so they'd assumed that he'd never had much luck with the ladies anyway.

"Just want you to be happy," says Elizabeth, "– ooh thank you – don't we, Graham?"

"What's going on?" asks Robin's dad.

There's the clink of ceramic as he hands the drinks over.

"Oh, he's gay," says Elizabeth conversationally. "I told you!"

Graham hums too, like he had his suspicions.

At the very least, the conversation shocks Robin out of his panic. He ends the discussion with promises of seeing them soon, and, yes Mam I'll be back on the 23rd, no I won't miss the train, yes Dad I've bought presents.

He hasn't, but that's beside the point.

Vlad shows up to Veronica’s Christmas party, on the Friday at the end of term. Sarah’s bought pills and Veronica takes two. Robin has found the dark drag of winter too unsettling to sleep again unaided and he knows he’s tired, bags under his eyes, but he lets Veronica pull him into a velvet shirt and a pair of her black jeans regardless when she says,

"That boy you fancy is back. He's in the common room."

"I don't _fancy_ him," says Robin. "Is he actually?"

"So you know who I mean."

Robin scoffs and Veronica giggles at him.

"Plain as day," she tells him and spritzes Robin unhelpfully with her perfume before dragging him to the shared bathrooms. She takes a picture of the two of them together in front of the mirror, which has a wiggly face drawn in the condensation.

Robin perfects his own chagrin smile for a few minutes before following Veronica back out into the hall.

Over his time at university, he's had to get better at concealing the worst of his emotions. Actually, when he comes to think about it, Robin has become quite the actor and a proficient liar. Even this doesn't stop him from wilting under the intensity of Vlad's gaze when he crosses the room to meet him and from thinking, yet again, that he's in trouble; that Veronica is right.

"Leather pants!" Sarah is shrieking, reaching out – always, always trying to touch.

The drugs have a lot to do with it.

"They look..." begins Robin, swallowing thickly, "uh..."

"Cold?" offers Vlad.

There's a sly smile creeping onto his face and Robin blushes. Vlad looks good and he knows it. Robin wants to hate him for it –

_'Can't you have insecurities to mask like everyone else!'_

– but it's too endearing.

"Cool," he says. "Sarah, would you stop!"

He has to push himself to socialise, at least in the beginning. Robin would much rather haul Vlad into the peace and quiet, where he can hear himself speak without shouting and the Happy Mondays aren't inspiring some Hacienda style dancing around the place. But Vlad wants to stay. He isn't a very good dancer, even Robin can see that, but he's charismatic. Robin is almost sure that's the word.

He joins the party because of Vlad.

Vlad pours him a drink and pushes it into Robin's hands. Luckily it all becomes easier after Robin has made his way steadily through three or four, and soon is laughing with the rest of the art crowd when Tom loses the last King in their game of Ring of Fire. It's difficult to admit but Robin almost finds that he's enjoying himself. He ends up being roped into a sing-along of _Fairytale of New York_ , where everyone shouts the curse words, and hardly notices at all that Vlad is sober throughout.

It's almost 4 am by the time the activity winds down. Partygoers begin to drop off here and there; one girl is found curled out in the stairwell after forgetting which flat she was trying to get back into. Some of the boys order a takeaway and Sarah tries to cajole Vlad for the third time that evening into her bedroom, but Vlad declines. He pulls Robin up from the sofa, arm closing firmly around his waist as the chill of his body seeps through the velvet of Robin's shirt. Robin is smiling drunkenly when Vlad deposits him into bed.

He goes on and on about what fun he's had. Robin even goes as far as saying he thinks he could be happy forever.

It's bullshit, of course.

He also swears there's something important he needs to ask Vlad about, and although it's lingering on the tip of his tongue, threatening like the dawn, Robin can't quite force it out of his mouth. He starts to garble alternatively about the events of the earlier evening, as if hoping it'll jog his memory, which Vlad endures with a grin.

"You chat a lot of rubbish when you're drunk, you know," he says.

And the world goes black around Robin again.

The hangover, when he wakes the next morning, is a killer. Robin is only thankful that Vlad comes back in the evening, bringing in the scent of night air and pine needles and something metallic, close to his mouth, when he laughs at Robin's complaints.

“Why didn’t you stay?” Robin asks, sickened by the taste of his cigarette as he tries, at last, to smoke one through. “Coulda slept on the sofa... Slept on my floor...”

“I’ve seen your damn floor,” Vlad tells him happily. “Only roaches down there. I might chance your bed.”

“Why don’t you?” asks Robin.

He might even be flirting.

Vlad hands him a glass of water and another Ibruprofen, shaking his head.

“I have a meeting tomorrow,” he explains without a beat. “I need to be ready.”

Robin is too busy trying not to retch as he swallows down the pill, to correct Vlad, to say he'd meant whenever he fancied, not just for the weekend.

As the month draws on, the building starts to quiet. Many others are excited for their break away from university, and pack up their belongings for the trip back home almost as soon as lectures finish. Like Robin, Veronica is sticking around until closer to Christmas, and Tom says his family only live like twenty minutes away so what's the point of going back to be nagged? He can eat Super Noodles for breakfast here, he points out. But then again, his dad tends to splash his money around over the festive period, and he'll probably get to drink in the pub for free.

"Don't really like Christmas," says Robin, on the 19th.

Vlad has been gone for a few days in a row and come back looking a little worse for wear. There's a rip in his leather jacket but he says he's alright. In Manchester, the rain and the grey of November stagnates and crawls over into December and January too, and the gloom gets to almost everyone. Vlad is apparently not immune.

"You don't really like much," he tells Robin, tossing one of his discarded chess pieces across the room at the boy.

"I do!" says Robin. "I like lotsa things."

"Name five."

"Right," says Robin, "easy. I like music – "

"Which music?"

"Fuck, any music, I dunno – "

"That isn't true."

"So you tell me," says Robin, "if you know it all."

"Alright," says Vlad. He crosses his legs. "Let's play a game."

It's truth or dare, essentially, except there are no dares and Vlad and Robin just take it in turns to speak a little more freely about themselves. It's like speed dating, Robin thinks.

He's never been speed dating in his life.

Vladimir, he deciphers, that's what Vlad is short for. The family is Romanian; they immigrated to Wales. And when Vlad doesn't ask about Robin's family, Robin takes another turn.

"What's your surname?"

"Doesn't matter," says Vlad. "I don't wanna tell you."

"Are you famous?" asks Robin.

Vlad rolls his eyes. "Define famous," he says. "Not in Britain, at least."

"Instagram model?"

"No!"

In any case, this time around, Vlad is willing to tell Robin about his family. He isn't very detailed, he doesn't have any photos. Vlad says he doesn't even own a mobile phone, and Robin laughs for a while until he realises, delightfully, that Vlad's telling him the truth.

He thinks, right, this guy's weird. Says it out loud. And it's helpful.

Vlad swears he isn't backwards.

His sister is Ingrid – pretty, he supposes, at least as far as he can tell from the gaggle of men that always seem to surround her. She's a feminist, too, outspoken and proud, disappointing always to their traditional father who still believes that women should stay in the home. He had a few cousins, once upon a time, but now Boris is dead and Olga lives in New Orleans and Malik, says Vlad, was thought to be his half-brother for a good long while. His mother is Magda, except she isn't really his mother, because that's Sally, and then there's Georgina, her daughter – but the whole clan is crazy, Vlad explains, so whatever.

"And we don't really speak to our grandparents."

It's an extensive family tree.

"I've been to Romania," Robin tells him. "Years ago, when I was a baby."

Then he isn't sure. Vlad holds a look of disbelief on his face whilst Robin digs around for an album – his mam's idea – and locates a photo near the front of him, in a frilly white babygrow, in his pram with his parents next to the signpost for Bistritz.

"I told you!" he says excitedly.

But Robin doesn't know why he remembers. His parents haven't spoken about the holidays of their younger years with him, and Chloe wasn't even an idea at that point in time to have any further knowledge. Ian and Paul, well, Robin reckons they've taken the picture, from the grubby little fingers that are half covering the camera lens, but they wouldn't have told him.

He doubts they'd care.

Vlad has fallen silent. He keeps the album in his hands, as he had with Robin's sketchbook, and turns the pages one by one and studies the faces in the photos. When he reaches five sheets to the end, he goes incredibly still to match.

Robin frowns, trying to look over his shoulder.

Vlad's eyes widen and definitively he slams the album shut.

"What?" cries Robin. "What 'ave you seen?"

He thinks it could be anything. He imagines for one horrific moment that it's one of the Polaroids that Veronica had taken, back when they were an item, wedged somehow in between the sleeves, and that Vlad's now seen far more of Robin than he's ever really cared for.

But it isn't.

He wrenches the album out of Vlad's hands and turns quickly to the back. There, clear as day, and he can hardly believe it, are two boys of 13 – the cake really gives it away – wearing the Stokely Grammar uniform and donning huge smiles.

Robin's jaw drops. Vlad springs to his feet.

An argument breaks out.

"It's not what you think!"

Vlad is insistent. Robin's having none of it.

"You were at my party!" he yells. "Or was I at yours? That's _my_ 'ouse! We went to school together."

"I couldn't tell you –" Vlad stutters.

He backs against the wall. He holds his arms bent at the elbows up beside his head, fists clenched, paler than usual. Robin wants to hit him. Robin wants to hug him. He's been right all along and Vlad, he's been lying. They've known each other for years.

They've known each other since the time before Robin lost his memory, before everything went to shit, before his life fell apart.

"Please don't come closer!"

"What the fuck, 'ave you _known_?"

"Yes," cries Vlad, "yes. I'm serious, stop."

Robin kicks the table. He's not taken off his Dr Martens and for that, he's grateful, because the desk dislodges from its place against the wall and books and bottles go flying. Robin feels the impact through the leather. He could have broken bones and he's glad. He launches his fists against the walls, the wardrobe, as Vlad's freezes in the corner.

The door bursts open.

"The fuck's going on? Robin!"

Hands are pulling at his shoulders. Veronica's dragging him away. Robin wants to hurt, hurt harder than he has, for years of his life but it's impossible, without hurting Veronica too like this, so he fights.

"Get out!" Veronica yells.

She's vicious. Vlad wastes little time.

It seems to take an age for Robin to calm down, but finally, sometime after midnight, he collapses onto his bed and sobs with earnest. Veronica stays with him. She strokes Robin's hair in the way she always used to; coos into his ear and tries to convince him to call his parents, early the next morning, but the attempts are futile. Robin doesn't believe for an instant that his parents don't remember.

If Robin had always been as truly alone as they'd inferred, surely they'd be able to recall the face or the name of the one other boy who had shown their son interest. Especially if they had photos.

The night seems to drag on forever.

Veronica falls asleep, eventually, at the end of Robin's bed, pillow tucked under her cheek while he paces the room. Robin doesn't follow suit. He stays up 'til morning, conspiracies running through his head, opening the photo album over and over just to stare back at the birthday party and make himself sick with longing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Interestingly I was supposed to visit Romania this summer with Bucharest and Brașov being two primary destinations. The tickets were booked, the excitement was real, and then Covid hit the UK and I am but a shell of my former self.


	4. Sugar For The Pill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by Slowdive.
> 
> Sorry, yes, this is a Christmas chapter. Sort of.

His dad is waiting at the train station, wearing a Christmas jumper. It's bright red and green and has horizontal stripes intercepted with dozens of tiny knitted reindeer, bells and sleighs in between.

Robin doesn't accept the hug, just flings his backpack and the binbag of presents into the boot of the car and climbs into the passenger seat.

"Merry Christmas," says Graham, pointedly, when he slides behind the wheel.

"Yeah," says Robin, "whatever."

His dad tuts.

The ride back to the house is an unpleasant one. Robin hasn't spoken a word to anyone since Veronica left for Cambridge, and now his dad is trying to engage him in pointless conversation about how he's doing, what he's been up, what he wants for dinner. Robin doesn't care about any of it, least of all have an opinion on the decorations decking the outside of the Branagh house, visible from half-way down the street.

At some point, Robin thinks, his dad has given the outdoor walls another coat of yellow paint, perhaps at a similar time as hanging the lights. The merry Father Christmas above the living room window has a glob of emulsion running down his beard and there are splatters on the paving stones below. The wreath is on the door, the Christmas tree is up in the corner of the living room and there's tinsel wrapped around the stair bannister.

Elizabeth Branagh comes through from the kitchen, mixing bowl in hands, and says,

"I'm making gingerbread!"

"Great," says Robin. "Hi, Mam."

He expects a comment about his weight or the way his shirt is hanging from his shoulders, but Elizabeth doesn't mention it. She looks pleased to have him home.

"'Ere," says Paul, his head rounding the doorway, "you get us anythin' good?"

"Shut up," says Robin through gritted teeth.

"Boys," sighs Elizabeth, as Ian still out of view lets out a laugh, "please, it's Christmas."

They spend the day of the 25th in much the same way as usual. Quite like the year before. At midnight, they go to Mass, listen to the sermon, and then everyone comes home and falls straight to sleep except for Robin, who lies on his bed on his back and stares at the ceiling. He might have drifted off around 6 am, but then there's a rapping at his door and he can hear Christmas carols drifting from downstairs.

"I'm havin' chocolate for breakfast!" Ian declares, already ripping into a selection box.

"Ian," whines Chloe, "that's no way to start your day."

She's at sixth form now, Robin remembers. She's upholding her reputation as the smartest Branagh child and taking Maths, Chemistry and Physics and, for a little bit of fun, Business Studies. She's got a boyfriend, too, that Robin's never met. She's wearing the set of pyjamas he had bought for her last Christmas and shiny silver locket she'd been given for her birthday.

Their mam follows Robin into the kitchen.

"You know," she says, "I might have a Baileys."

Chloe just shakes her head.

Dad gets the guitar out. He treats them, his words, to a rendition of  _ Ding Dong Merrily On High _ while everyone helps themselves to breakfast, Robin forcing down a slice of dry toast and cringing all the while.

"What about  _ Deck The Halls _ ?"

"No," says Chloe. "Why don't we do presents?"

There's a shiny stack with Robin's name on them beneath the tree. His mam's perfectly crafted masterpieces really put his own wrapping to shame, and he notices of course that they have been tucked towards the back, closest to the wall and out of view. There's a new set of Fineliners from his parents, some expensive drawing inks and the customary pair of socks, amongst other bits and pieces. Chloe has settled on a cashmere jumper and again, Robin doesn't dare to ask how many Saturday shifts she's worked to save up for it. Auntie Carys has of course done her usual, much to the dismay of everyone gathered – 

"Oh, honestly, Graham, it's like she doesn't know him at all!"

– and given Robin an address book.

The rest of the family open their gifts from Carys in the minutes that follow and, sure enough, discover similar gifts with varying levels of disappointment.

"I suppose we needed another toilet roll holder..." says Elizabeth, optimistically, turning the diamonte studded monstrosity over in her hands. "Graham, what's she given to you?"

"An open bag of potpourri," he says.

And Chloe decides at that moment she's rather pleased with her sealed bottle of scented talcum powder after all.

One of the twins, however – Robin doesn't read the tag before he tears open the wrapping – has gifted him a calendar, which at first seems to be a pretty standard albeit boring present. And then Robin turns it over. Word must have gotten out. He holds up the item, out for the family, and asks,

"Who's idea's this?"

Chloe gasps. Ian and Paul begin to laugh. Their mam looks up, from where she's been setting out a tray of mince pies, and gives a small squeak as if scandalised before she giggles.

Depicted on the calendar is a different naked fireman for every month of the year.

Robin glares at it.

Ian throws a ball of wrapping paper at his head.

Then Robin begins to laugh too.

His dad comes back in with a glass of sherry and almost chokes when he sees it, crying,

"Boys, that really isn't appropriate!"

But the rest of the family is too tickled to pay much attention, even Robin, who's cheeks are pink. Paul nudges his shoulder and ruffles his hair, pushing Robin over onto the carpet.

"Mam said not to mention it, but we reckoned it'd cheer you up."

"Yeah," says Robin, "I'll 'ang it above my bed, shall I?"

"Aye, whatever tickles your fancy!"

"Right, put it away," says Graham.

The Queen's Speech goes on at 3 pm sharp, right after Christmas lunch, and then everyone puts on their shoes and coats to make the rounds.

"Come on," groans Robin, because the sky has gone incredibly dark, "it's not like Nana knows what day it is..."

"She most certainly does," says his mam.

"She doesn't," says Ian, "but don't be a dick."

"Walk'll do you good, Robin," says Graham, clapping him on the back. "Build up those muscles."

"What muscles?" says Robin.

"Exactly!"

As they head out of the house, Ian and Paul still – at the age of 22 – wearing matching bomber jackets, and their mam and dad in scarves and woolly hats, Chloe falls into line beside Robin.

"You don't look very good," she says, observant as ever.

Robin rolls his eyes.

"Don't know what you mean."

Stokely Castle's ruins are silhouetted in the moonlight high upon the hill. It manages to look threatening even with the sound of Brenda Lee blasting out of No. 35, a party already in full swing.

"You can lie to yourself," Chloe tells Robin, "but don't lie to me. What's going on?"

"I've met someone," mumbles Robin.

"You're acting like this over a  _ boy _ ?"

"No," he says, "be stupid."

"That's just what you said."

"I don't mean like that," says Robin.

He jumps as they round a corner and come face to face with Mrs Smith from No. 7 on her evening dog walk.

"Robin," says Chloe, "relax."

"That's it," he says, "I can't. And last month I met someone. Chloe, do you remember anyone called Vlad?"

She doesn't. Chloe tries her best and really strives to recall, but ultimately she draws a blank. She's still attempting to remember as they reach their grandparent's house, and their nana is pottering around in the doorway while Robin casts anxious glances over his shoulder.

"Yes, Mam, it's Christmas Day," Elizabeth is saying. "We've brought some gifts."

"Evelyn,  _ dewch i mewn _ !"

"He mustn't have been around very much," says Chloe in a low voice, to Robin, as she accepts a biscuit from their grandad and sits down in the floral armchair. "How old did you say you were?"

"13," Robin tells her.

Chloe shakes her head. In fact, she says, she doesn't remember spending very much time with Robin at that age at all; now that she thinks about it, there are gaps in her memory too.

"Have you asked Dad?" she suggests.

"No," says Robin. "Don't."

Something is going on.

Their grandparent's living room is much too warm and the curtains smell like mothballs and lavender. In part, this is why Robin had never learned Welsh. He sits next to Chloe on the side of the armchair, chewing at his nails, nodding at intervals whenever Nana starts gesturing in his direction. Ian and Paul to their credit have learnt a couple of words between them but they're also fidgetting. Their dad is pulling at the collar of his jumper, sweat on his forehead.

Chloe speaks Welsh perfectly. Obviously she does.

"Grandad's asking if you want a cup of tea," she explains. "Says you look peaky."

"I'm fine, Grandad," Robin tells him, loudly, as if somehow volume alone will transcend the language barrier. In case it doesn't, he gives the elderly man a two thumbs up, which unfortunately then is taken to mean that yes, he would like a cup of tea.

Robin forces a smile of gratitude onto his face as he takes the mug and stares down into the milky concoction.

Thankfully, finally, the decision is made to leave. The wintry air hits Robin like a slap in the face, and his nana's lips hit the other cheek as if there's anything in him to appreciate. Mam's making arrangements to call round a week on Sunday, alternating between sentences in fluent Welsh and English without seeming to think twice.

Somehow, when Mam's speaking English, everyone seems to understand. Maybe that's because she's their daughter. Or maybe both grandparents can speak English themselves and it's just another fun joke that Robin hasn't been let in on.

Cry to the angels, that would be his luck.

Chloe is still watching out of the corner of her eye. Robin estimates he has room for approximately three more suspicious thoughts before he implodes, and no sooner than the door has closed on his grandparent's house he sets off at a fast walk back home.

The discovery in the photo album hasn't been out of his mind since that very evening. Robin knows it's unhealthy to stew in this way – hell, experience alone proves it – but he's stuck, replaying the argument with Vlad over and over again and honestly, it's destroying him. He moves quickly, ahead of the family. The dark trees streak past; the noise from the party at No. 35 is no more than a dull drone. Robin keeps his eyes on the pavement. Still, the notion that something is hovering over his shoulder lingers ever-present, maybe nothing more than a figment of his imagination, but Robin walks faster.

He feels like he might be sick.

His life hasn't been his own, he thinks, for years. He can't take the ownership of the things that he needs to because he just can't separate the fiction from the reality; doesn't know where he truly starts or where his memories – fickle, fleeting, fucked up – begin. There's something hollow in the cavern of his mind that Robin is needing to either fill in or cut out. He needs to remember what had happened in the lost years of his life to really calculate where, in the subsequent years, everything had gone wrong.

It wasn't always like this.

He wasn't such a mess.

There was a time Robin could trust his parents to be nothing but loving and truthful, if a little overbearing, and now alternatively he's convinced himself that they're hiding too much. And from Chloe, as well. How she's growing up to be happy and healthy is beyond Robin's comprehension, and why neither Ian nor Paul have the faintest idea that anything is out of place is truly beyond him.

Do Robin's parents even know? Do they have any answers at all?

Is Robin blaming them for something out of their hands that at the same time he thinks it's their responsibility to recognise?

All above are equally as likely as not.

But what Robin really can't shake, now more than ever, is why so frequently he just gets a  _ feeling _ . Like being scared of the dark. Like being compelled to keep drawing the things that terrify him. Like thinking for no particular reason that he recognises Vlad's face from the past and knowing that he's been to Romania, knowing that things used to be different; wanting, whilst drunk, to express something important, but feeling the weight of haze that blocks him from retrieving the exact recollection.

Robin hates it. He hates the card he's been dealt, for whatever reason, in a far more insidious way than the rest of his peers.

He rounds the corner onto their street, the bright yellow exterior of the house lit up with Christmas decorations. He can vaguely hear his dad calling somewhere behind him,

"Robin, what's the rush?"

But he's dead-set on getting through his front door, up the stairs, and on locking himself away from the rest of the evening. Unfortunately, there's an unexpected visitor – the boy, dressed all in black, pressing his face up against the Branagh's window as if trying to see if they're in.

"What the  _ fuck  _ are you doin' 'ere?" Robin hisses, as he marches up the drive.

Vlad spins around.

"Just hear me out – " he begins.

"Why should I – so you can lie some more?"

"No, I wanna come clean!"

Robin could have swung for him. His family's timing, however, is impeccable as they too turn onto the drive and Elizabeth cries, both in shock and excitement,

"Robin, who's this?"

"I mighta known it was something!" says Graham.

He's out of breath from the sounds of it and Robin looks over his shoulder just in time to see the renewed frown on Chloe's face, even as she clutches the stitch in her ribs.

"No one," he tells them. "It's nothin'."

"Ooh," jokes Ian, "is this your boyfriend?"

"Ey, don't let 'im see your calendar, Robin!"

"Please," Vlad whispers. "I just need ten minutes."

"Five," says Robin.

"Well don't just stand there," says Graham, "open the door."

"Why don't you come in?"

Elizabeth gets out her own key and sidles around Robin. Whether friend or foe, she touches Vlad gently on the shoulder as she moves past and treats him to one of her motherly smiles.

"Thanks," says Vlad quietly.

He swallows the lump in his throat and glances towards Robin.

"Suppose you know the way," says Robin with a glare. He pushes Vlad inside and baits off his parents.

By the time he gets upstairs, Vlad is already in his bedroom. He's standing, more accurately, in the doorway, staring around at the empty walls with a pained expression.

"You took it all down," he says, almost sadly, as Robin comes up behind him.

"What down?" asks Robin. "See, you're doin' it again."

He barges past, striding to the window. He rips back the curtain and brings the pouch of tobacco out of his pocket, rolling a cigarette in a matter of moments and opening the latch. He daren't smoke in front of his parents, which is lucky really; he would have tanked through several at his grandparent's house alone, and would have to stay to listen to a translated-by-Chloe lecture on the dangers of doing so.

Vlad looks worried, still lingering on the threshold.

"Close the door," says Robin.

The voice of Elizabeth Branagh asking who fancies some trifle instantly fades away.

"Robin..." says Vlad.

Robin is nauseous. It takes him several attempts to light his cigarette because his hands are shaking, although his jaw is set tight. He can't believe, of all places, that Vlad has the gall to show up here. In Stokely, at the family home. He'd definitely known Robin all along, then, if he remembered where he lived. Robin presses his forehead against the window frame, hard enough to leave an indent he knows when he finally pulls it away.

"Shouldn't you be at home?" he asks. "Celebratin', with your family?"

"I..." Vlad pauses. "Our type. We don't exactly celebrate Christmas."

"Your  _ type _ ?"

"Listen," he says.

He heaves a sigh. He wanders very cautiously to perch on the edge of Robin's bed, and Robin wants to hit him all over again. He doesn't want this imposter to be in his room, to touch his belongings. But his anger ebbs away. Robin is tired, he's always tired. And for once Vlad looks as if sleep's evading him too. His expression is pinched and he can't seem to bring himself to settle his full weight back against the mattress.

"We lived here," says Vlad, "up in the castle."

"It's a ruin," Robin tells him.

"Until how long ago? My sister saw to that."

"Right?"

"I wanted to tell you," says Vlad, "honest I did. But you wouldn't understand. You'd think I was crazy."

"And now?" says Robin.

"Now I think you hate me."

"I do," says Robin. He chucks the last half of the cigarette down into the driveway. "But I don't. I'm confused."

"I'm really not surprised."

The boys stare at each other; Robin feels his heart beating out the seconds. Then Vlad bites his lip and pats the space beside him on the bed piteously. He reminds Robin, for a moment, of a doting parent, convincing their son to come over, sit down.

_ 'You know you can tell me anything, right?' _

The sickness rises again.

If anything, Robin believes he's already given too much of himself to this boy and all, he thinks, because Vlad has those cheekbones, that jawline, those legs wrapped up in tight denim. He feels uneasy even thinking about it, so Robin pushes the thoughts down and goes mutely to his side. He sits inches away, jamming his hands between his thighs, willing Vlad to be the first to speak in case a whole load of rubbish comes spewing from Robin's lips involuntarily. 

"Where do I start?" sighs Vlad. "It's a long story."

"What's it to do wi' me?"

"Everything," says Vlad, "in the beginning."

He weaves a miserable tale. His family, as he'd said, had immigrated from the Transylvania region; they'd been fairly wealthy and a shade dysfunctional. They'd been chased away by the locals – on this, Vlad is sparse on the detail – because of something to do with his father, and arrived in Stokely with little more than their heritage, a beat-up old hearse, and the fortune and expectation behind their name.

Vlad was 12. And he was lonely. And on the first day, he says, a boy of his own age had somehow crawled right in through his window, bold as brass, bright as day – despite his gothic clothes – and introduced himself without a beat.

"Well..."

Vlad pulls a face. Robin had been for a wander uninvited around the castle first of all, but then they'd exchanged the pleasantries.

"I don't remember," says Robin.

He's staring at a stain on his carpet near the wardrobe. He imagines it was fake blood, from a Halloween long ago.

"I'm getting to that," Vlad tells him. "As I said, it's a long story."

They'd gone to the same school, evident of course from their uniforms in the photograph. They were friends. Vlad had known all of Robin's family, too – remembers his brothers' love of football and his dad's enthusiasm for camping, and about how loving his mam had always been and that Chloe was the best in her year.

He leaves out a few details, Robin is almost sure of it, from the way Vlad begins to speak and then derails the sentence, switching the subject. He tells the story but omits certain details. Whatever they did years ago, on the weekends and evenings spent together as boys, remains a mystery but Robin has a feeling it's best to listen. The room grows cold around them, window left open, but he doesn't move.

Vlad doesn't mention it.

It's been longer than the five minutes that Robin had promised but there's so much more that he's needing to hear. Even if they were friends, thinks Robin, that doesn't explain the complete blank in his memory where all of these things were supposed to be.

Vlad wipes a hand over his face, hunching forwards to rest his elbows on his knees.

"One night, we had to leave again. No one wanted it. You were supposed to be going to a fancy dress party but you showed up at the castle instead, and then came your family. Everything was chaos. We were fighting with the slaye – the  _ woodwork teacher  _ – and I had to make a choice."

"You left town cos of a  _ teacher _ ?"

"He wanted to hurt my dad. D'you remember the Van Helsings?"

"Yeah," says Robin, with a frown. "Jonno dropped outta school, he – we di'n't speak much – it was awkward."

Vlad nods.

Robin says, "You know his dad's dead?"

"I do," grumbles Vlad, "and  _ that _ was my fault – "

"What?"

"I didn't kill him! Before you get that idea."

"Why would I – "

"It doesn't matter. Anyway. Me and Dad had to leave, and Ingrid, she stayed; stayed for years – until the castle burnt. But we had to make it so no one came after us. That was the choice. I'm not asking you to understand this, Robin, really I'm not, but there's a reason you can't remember and it's because you know me."

It doesn't make sense.

Robin is suddenly aware that he's crept forwards, closer to Vlad, as if hanging onto every word that he says. Vlad goes on,

"All those weird things that happened in Stokely a few years ago, like the –"

"Sheep," says Robin. "The farmer's kept findin' their sheep dead."

"And that unsolved murder; people going missing. All of it, to do with my family. If not Dad, then Ingrid. It's been quiet, hasn't it, since she left?"

"I'm not really sure..."

Vlad might have just confessed that his family were serial killers but for some reason, this doesn't seem to bother Robin in the way it should. Vlad, as far as he can tell, has little to do with it. There's a thickness to his voice, like dragging a wellington out of a peat bog, and all Robin wants to do in a turn of events is wrap Vlad up in his arms, as if Vlad's the one who needs comforting.

"Where are you now?" he asks instead.

"I can't tell you," says Vlad, "it's dangerous."

"I don't need an address, just like a county or – "

"It was Lancashire, after Stokely. But I move around a lot."

"You got 'ere on Christmas  _ Day _ ," says Robin, "from  _ Lancashire _ ?"

"No," mumbles Vlad.

There's a loud knock on the door.

"You boys alright in there?"

"Yeah," shouts Robin. He daren't take his eyes off the boy. "Uh... start the board games without me?"

His mam moves away.

"I'm a vampire," says Vlad painfully. "That's why I  _ work _ nights. That's why I'm always creeping around outside."

“Vampires don’t exist,” says Robin.

But his voice trembles as if he’s unsure, without explanation.

“Then what are you scared of,” asks Vlad, “in the dark?”

“What?” croaks Robin.

Vlad closes his eyes. A muscle twitches in the right of his cheek, just above his mouth.

“Everything went a little wrong,” says Vlad. “You weren’t supposed to have... repercussions. It was supposed to be a clean break.”

“How d’you know?” asks Robin. This is another thing he’s never seen fit to explain to his family, except for the attempt when it came out he was gay – he'd shrugged off their questions of why he’d suddenly starting leaving the lamp on at night for years. “About the dark?” he says. "How?”

“I’m sorry,” says Vlad.

He’s shaking his head. He opens his eyes and they’re wet and his face is all twisted up with repressed emotion.

“I kept tabs. I wanted you to be safe.”

“I dunno what 'appened,” says Robin. Each breath is painful. “I don’t know who I am or who I was and I don’t know you. But I know your face. I’ve known it since before we met again.”

“We were best friends,” Vlad tells him. "I did this to you."

It’s pitiful and there’s a lump in Robin’s throat.

"All of you. Your parents found out. You guessed right from the off that we were vampires – fuck, you  _ wanted _ to believe it. And Renfield, our butler, it got him too, the mind-wipe."

"The  _ mind-wipe _ ?"

"It's why you don't remember," says Vlad. Again he looks away. "We needed to leave Stokely and we couldn't let you come after us. You would've done, Robin. And so would the slayers, the Van Helsings. This time 'round, I thought... I wanted it to work. I thought we could be friends again."

If Robin had been told this, off the bat, only an hour ago, he knows that already he'd be standing up, wanting to scream and shout and accuse Vlad of stealing his childhood, his teenage years and his life, however nonsensical. Whatever memories he’s lost, they’re significant to Robin but now he sees almost shamefully that they are to Vlad as well.

"You can't hypnotise the people you love," explains Vlad. "At least, not the people you're  _ in love _ with. So, I know the mind-wipe worked, but not in the way that it should've; not on you, like with your family. I bet they don't realise at all."

"No," says Robin. "They don't."

The confession unexpectedly hits him.

"Wait..."

"It's not like I was in love with you," says Vlad quickly, "not really. But I wasn't...  _ not _ in love with you, if you follow."

"I'm losin' what's left of my mind 'ere."

“Can't we just start over?"

“Is any of this true?”

But of course it is. Robin doesn’t want to – can’t possibly – believe it but there’s no reason for the boy in front of him to be lying now, and there’s nothing that could convince Robin that what he’s witnessing is pure acting talent alone. Vlad is torn. His shoulders are shaking. He won’t look at Robin anymore and his gaze is focused solely on the space between his legs, at the laces of his boots and the creasing of the leather.

How long had Vlad been watching over him?

Since he left, perhaps? Since leaving Stokely? Had the shadow at Robin's window always been this boy, this  _ vampire _ , not meaning to cause harm but wanting to prevent it?

Had Vlad seen all the ways in which the absence of memory had fucked Robin up to a royal degree?

Robin doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t have an extensive arsenal. Whenever Veronica had cried, admittedly not often, he would sit at the other end of the bed or the couch feeling awkward. She would go to him and tuck her head under his chin. Robin would awkwardly pat her arm.

This is different.

He wants to move. With no reference to call back to and no idea as to whether or not he is right, Robin pushes himself forwards. The bed creaks as his weight shifts and Vlad glances up only when Robin's face is inches from his.

Robin takes the opportunity, tilts his head, and kisses Vlad on the lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Doesn't everyone have an Auntie Carys?


	5. You Are The Coffin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by Flatsound.

Ian and Paul would say that crying is for girls, but as Robin lies beside Vlad much later, just as the dawn is about to break, eyes sore and cheeks salty, truth be told he feels much better.

Kind of.

There's a whole load of new – or old? – information swirling around in his brain and he's trying to process it, bit by bit; trying to get past the screaming in his head that's demanding, this is all bullshit, vampires are fictional creatures!

“I can’t leave,” Vlad mumbles, “once the sun rises. I’m serious, you know, right?”

“Right,” says Robin.

Vlad’s arms tighten around his waist. Robin isn’t sure, still with so many conflicting feelings, but he knows that vampires burn in the sunlight and whether or not he can let himself believe that particular aspect, Vlad certainly does. His skin is so cold. Vlad’s chest doesn’t rise and fall, his breath doesn’t skirt over Robin’s neck and Robin thinks that perhaps, if he pressed two fingers over Vlad’s wrist, he’d struggle to find a vein with a pulse.

Maybe it's a load of rubbish. Maybe this is just another person trying to wheedle their way into Robin's life to achieve some kind of fucked up internalised fulfilment. Or maybe it's the truth.

Robin is ashamed for wanting it to be the truth.

Vlad had said to him, "I don't want you to remember all of the horrible things that went along with being my friend. How my sister tried to ruin your family. About my dad. Any of it."

Robin had said he didn't care.

Vlad had reached for Robin's sketchbook and showed him the watercolour of the vampire on the throne.

"That," he'd said, without doubt, "is The Count."

Now Robin reaches for Vlad's hand and does, in fact, press his fingers to his wrist. Vlad flinches but allows it. He tilts his head back to meet Robin's eyes and kisses him soundly when Robin, dry-mouthed, doesn't find the thrumb of blood.

"What are you gunna do?" Robin asks. "I've a feelin' this isn't great for me to know."

"No," says Vlad, "it isn't. I don't know."

There's a pause. The house around them hums with the sounds of sleep. Ian is snoring one bedroom over.

"I've got responsibilities," says Vlad. "You asked once if I was famous, and... that's the closest thing I can liken it to."

"What  _ is  _ your surname?"

"Dracula," says Vlad.

"Fuck off."

Then Robin really thinks about it.

"Jesus Christ, it is an' all."

"The novel," says Vlad, "uh... long lost family history. And fortunately, only half of it's true."

"Jesus," says Robin again.

He starts to laugh because he can't think of a justified response, nor really help himself from recognising the absurdity. The very book in it's bound red leather casing has been sitting on Robin's bookshelf for the best part of ten years. Never once in the time since developing his fear of the dark had Robin even been tempted to pick it up.

Vlad's hand cradles his cheek. The boy's echoed laughter turns into peppered kisses, starting at Robin's mouth and working down along his jaw and his neck. Robin only stops finding everything funny because he's seized with the fear instead that Vlad is going to bite him. His neck is wide open, full of pulsing veins and arteries and, he might imagine it, but for a brief second Robin thinks he feels Vlad's fingers close tightly in the front of his t-shirt and the scrape of teeth against his skin.

Vlad yanks back his head and flings himself across the room. Robin has never seen a person move so quickly.

Vlad's eyes are black as he pulls his arms up around his head, as he had back in Robin's room at university when they'd had the argument. He's struggling to get a hold of himself. Robin sits up, and then he understands – Vlad hadn't been afraid of Robin's reaction that night, he'd been afraid of himself – and then  _ he _ wants to apologise.

Either Vlad is crazy, thinks Robin, or he's a vampire.

That's just how it is.

He says nothing, pulls his t-shirt straight over his collarbones and waits. When he glances towards the window, to see the first tinges of gold and pink and a lighter shade of navy beginning to creep up into the sloe of the sky, Robin notices his own reflection in the glass but nothing of Vlad's. He looks back, to ensure that Vlad is still there; then repeats the action. Goosebumps prickle all the way down his arms.

"It's almost sunrise," says Vlad, sounding choked. He isn't going to mention whatever just happened. "I need to get moving."

"You could stay," tries Robin. 

He doesn't know why. He thinks for sure he should be legging it to the kitchen by now in hopes of finding garlic.

"This room's quite dark. You might remember, I dunno."

"Thanks," says Vlad, "but no."

He gives Robin a wry smile as he pulls his jacket from the beneath the bed. That, along with Robin's cardigan, had been flung down there just after they'd closed the window, somewhere between the tears and confessions and uncoordinated kisses.

Vlad seems reluctant to come any closer. Robin scrambles to his knees on the bed and Vlad takes another step back.

"I'm gunna go," he says and moves for the door.

"Wait!" Robin's on his feet. "Will I see you again? You can't just leave like this."

"You'll see me," says Vlad, "I promise."

And he's gone. He's pulled open Robin's bedroom door and his footsteps thunder down the stairs, the front door slams behind him and Robin is alone, stumbling out to clutch the stair bannister and just hoping that Vlad turns around.

"Robin," comes his mam's voice from the end of the corridor, "what are you doing? Get back to bed!"

There's little reason now to involve the rest of the family in whatever Robin has himself caught in. He closes the curtains in his bedroom and falls into a fitful sort of sleep, floating between dreams of flying, of falling, of monsters with sharp teeth and claws pulling at his legs. When he wakes, it's to Chloe shaking him instead, telling him that it's ten o'clock, and he's almost missed breakfast.

"Mum won't have it," she tells him, "come on, get up. Are those yesterday's jeans? You've got some explaining!"

The twins, after Chloe, are the ones most interested in getting to the bottom of the mysterious visitor, who had entered their house in the early evening and disappeared during the course of the night. Their dad had been the one to come up to Robin's room the second time the night before, before he went to bed at approximately 11 pm, to ask if this boy was supposed to be staying over.

He keeps exchanging looks across the table with Elizabeth, who's folding the laundry and shaking her head.

"Well, 'e must be someone!" Ian insists, hammering Robin quite forcefully in the arm when he refuses once again to give anything away. "Why don't you wanna tell us?"

"Yeah," says Paul, "we're open-minded, aren't we? Supportive big brothers."

"Supportive?" says Robin. "I don't think so."

"Well," says their mam, "he must've needed us, to not have been home on Christmas Day. Fancy that. You never know what someone's going through."

"I've got an idea," says Paul, with a smirk.

Ian's laughter rumbles from beside him and Robin decides he'll get up to make a cup of tea after all.

"None of that," warns Graham.

"You met 'im on Grinder?" asks Ian. "Be 'onest."

"Ian!"

"Now what on earth's Grinder?"

"Nothing, Mum," says Chloe quickly. "Could we try to have an adult conversation please?"

"It's pretty adult," says Ian with a shrug.

Robin wishes the linoleum would swallow him up.

"Is the library open?" he asks, and without waiting for an answer, "I'm goin' to the library."

"It's Boxing Day!" shouts Elizabeth after him. "Robin, you won't – oh never mind!"

He's already out of the door.

Of course his mam is right, and it's the 26th December so obviously the library isn't open. Robin paces around outside the building instead, as if hoping that someone will take pity and let him inside. The air is cold but the jumper that Chloe has bought for him is soft and warm and smells like her bedroom – vanilla and coconut. Robin wishes he could hitchhike up to Lancashire, fill his nostrils once more with the fresh scent of pine and aftershave, and gorge himself on the answers he'd hoped to get from books.

He hasn't a chance. Lancashire isn't a small country. Could be Pendle or Rossendale or it could be Blackpool, for all Robin knows. Still, he'd give it a go, had he thought ahead and if the only people around weren't holding hands with their children and casting him curious looks.

He walks, in the end, back past the house and follows the road up the hill to the castle. Robin lurks around there for the best part of the day, scuffing his boots through the dirt in the ruins, finding charred wooden furniture that's all but fallen to pieces. He tries to imagine what a Dracula's castle would have looked like, from the inside, once upon a time. He thinks about the watercolour he'd painted unknowingly of Vlad's own father.

For the most part, that's how Robin spends the remainder of the Christmas holiday. There's no sign of Vlad – no whisper or shadow. He hugs his dad this time before boarding the train, as if to apologise for any nasty thoughts that have become too apparent in his behaviour, and texts his mam to say he loves her as he pulls out of Lower Stokely Station.

He tells himself he'll try harder.

"How was your break?" asks Veronica, when Robin trudges into the kitchen with the dead leaves and mud that evening.

"Alright," says Robin.

Not entirely a lie.

"You look good!" she tells him. "You've put weight on, can see it in your face."

"My mam's a feeder."

"My grandma is too!"

"What's goin' on?" Robin asks.

He's looking around the room and slowly taking in all the things that are different – like the bin, instead of overflowing, wrapped up into one neat black bag on the floor and waiting to be taken out. The boxes of cardboard recycling are gathered on the work counter and there's a collection of empty bottles, the dregs of beer and milk swilled down the sink, standing beside them.

"Oh, we let Vlad in," says Veronica sweetly, as if that explains it all.

Robin frowns, drops his bags and goes to his bedroom.

He brings his keys out of his pocket, but the door is already ajar. The first thing he seems is the goddamn rented university camera sitting dust-free on his desk. Then Vlad, with his back to the door, is turning his head.

"I checked the train times," he says.

"What 'ave you done?"

Because Robin's bedroom is spotless. More or less. At least, as far as his standards go. Half of the bottles in the kitchen must be from his room alone; they aren't cluttering the floor and the desk anymore and all of his sketchbooks, save for the one he'd taken home, and his coursework are stacked in size order up on the shelf. The vacuum cleaner looks quite out of place in the middle of the room. The collection of mugs that Robin has accumulated over the last few months have also been sought out, cleaned up, and then tucked away.

The ashtray is empty. The wardrobe is organised, instead of items of clothing lying scattered around on the floor. The photograph of Robin with his family, on a sunny day some 12 years ago, at Haven Porthmadog is also back in its frame on the bedside table.

"Spring cleaning," offers Vlad, while Robin is gawping.

"It's only been dark for an 'our!"

"I'm super speedy," says Vlad, and he flashes a grin. "A click of my fingers. Sorry, I forget it's not... normal, exactly."

"It's amazin'," says Robin, gobsmacked.

"Can you snog already?" comes Veronica's voice from the hallway.

Robin shuts the door.

Regardless of the risk, he bares the other boy down onto his freshly made bed and kisses him until Robin is convinced he's lost the air from his lungs as well as his common sense. He's  _ missed _ him, he realises; Robin feels it ripping through his insides as surely as Vlad's nails press into his hips and pull him harder. He hadn't expected the impact of Vlad's absence to hit him as strongly as this.

He wants to tell Vlad that he's been up to the castle; that he's lay in bed almost every night thinking of nothing but him – and of vampires, but not in the usual way, not after the first night. Robin keeps his mouth busy elsewhere; decides it can wait. Vlad only stops him with the semblance of a whine when Robin's hands have rucked his shirt up out of jeans and started to follow with a long-forgotten want the lean muscle of his stomach.

"You'll be the undeath of me," Vlad gasps, and Robin snorts and buries his face against Vlad's chest.

Later, he recounts his visits to Stokely Castle.

Vlad says that Robin has never been very skilled in understanding what is and isn't good for him –

"A panache for danger," he stresses.

– and Robin sighs because he's sure that all he's done for the past few years is try to hide from his fears.

Vlad explains that isn't what he means. Not entirely. He lifts himself up from the bed, rebuttoning his shirt and tucking it back into his jeans. Robin only has to blink before Vlad is standing as if nothing untoward had happened at all, and presently remembers that he wants a cigarette.

As he, too, climbs to his feet, Vlad raises his eyebrows with a nod.

"Case in point."

"It's easy for you," says Robin dismissively.

He can’t imagine a vampire’s lungs turning black with smoke or cancers creeping in to suffocate their bodies.

"It's a stupid habit," says Vlad. "And don't tell me they taste good."

Robin snickers as he swipes his tongue against the gum of the paper.

"Menthol's better," he explains, "and real cigs are alright. Veronica brought some of those skinny lilac ones back from Paris once.  _ Vogue _ , I think."

" _ Vogue _ ," says Vlad. "Right."

"Come on," says Robin.

He could do without a lecture. He pushes back the blinds as Vlad shakes his head, evidently finding fault, but slaps Robin's ashtray down on the windowsill beside him nevertheless and props his hip against the desk. Robin can't place the expression on Vlad's face, so he chooses not to. He clicks his lighter; the end of the rollie ignites and he breathes deeply, inhaling the nicotine.

"It's meant to combat stress, isn't it?" asks Vlad.

As if he's never known anyone to smoke before.

Robin shrugs.

"Jus' an 'abit, by now," he says, "like you said."

"So why'd you start?

A pregnant pause.

"Because Jac Mallory kicked seven shades of shit outta me," says Robin eventually, "for somethin' I couldn't remember, an' some old bloke at the bus stop said I looked like I needed one."

"You used to say it was gross."

"I used to 'ave a best friend."

Suddenly the taste is sour in Robin's mouth.

It all comes down to one thing, doesn't it? All leads back to the same person.

He looks away from Vlad, blowing a lungful of smoke out of the open window.

Vladimir Dracula, he thinks – a vampire, or so the story goes. The idea still sends shivers down Robin's spine although he isn't afraid of the boy. From what little he's seen, the Vlad standing in his bedroom in the university halls is a far cry from the blood-thirsty creatures of the night that Robin had drawn in his sketchbook. He'd cleaned the flat. He'd pushed his nose into Robin's hair. He'd danced, before Christmas, to  _ Hallelujah Club Mix _ in the common room.

The concept in itself is ridiculous, yet Robin has found he believes Vlad. He isn't naive, nor completely stupid, and whilst there's every possibility that Vlad is a master manipulator – that all of it, a fabrication – to what end, Robin isn't sure – there's definitely something unusual about the situation; something in the fact that, whenever Robin thinks on it, the instant prompted response is  _ vampires don't exist. _

Robin believes the mind-wipe, that much at least.

How this would be achieved without the aid of supernatural ability, there isn't an answer. But what Robin really needs to know is why it was necessary, or what he had done to warrant a blanket removal of his memories and total erasure of the chapter in his life?

"I've been thinking," says Vlad quietly, "about what happens next. Actually, I was hoping you wouldn't bring it up, and... We'd just carry on."

"What d'you mean?" asks Robin.

Finally, he crushes what little is left of his cigarette into the ashtray and, pulling the window shut, turns back into the room. Vlad hasn't budged.

"I told you about the Van Helsings, right?"

"Yeah," says Robin.

Once privy to the same secrets as him.

Vlad nods slowly.

"I guess finding your father drained of blood really kicks up the past," he says, with a dry huff. "Jonno came after me, you know. He sought me as a slayer."

"He remembered?" breathes Robin.

"Him and his mother. And I took the mind-wipe off Renfield."

"So it's broken?"

"It's lifted."

"So that's great," says Robin. It's suddenly far too good to be true. “You could bring back  _ my _ memories, coul'n't you? But there's a catch."

"There's a catch," agrees Vlad.

He moves away. The following silence stagnates in the air between the two boys, as Vlad begins to pace doggedly around the room. Robin needn't have been afraid of hearing that it wasn't possible, that Vlad couldn't just magic something up, because his expression gives everything away.

But what's the secret and why's he stalling?

What could be worse, thinks Robin, than the total annihilation of his reality?

"Tell me," he begs. "You don't know what it's like. I can't tell what's real and what isn't and it's been  _ years _ , Vlad. I'm goin' mad."

Then it comes out,

"I thought I wanted to die, earlier this year. Not like 'ang myself from the rafters kinda die, but like... step out into the road an' see what 'appens."

"Don't," Vlad tells him lowly.

"So what's the catch?"

For a moment, Robin's mind flits wildly between one possibility and the next – from insanity to grandeur, to the immediate realisation that Vlad is someone to be feared. Then, with a moan of frustration, Vlad sinks onto the side of the bed.

"There are two options," he says, "as I see it. I can bring back your memory but I’ll have to leave. Or, we can stay like this, as we are."

No mentions of insanity. No rushing to grab for the closest pointed item.

Robin stares, baffled, before he asks, "Is that it?"

But after the time he's had, he should get his cake and eat it too.

"Why would you leave?"

Visible discomfort passes over Vlad's face.

"Because I  _ knew  _ that getting involved was a bad idea. I did it anyway. Just like Dad."

Robin is about to open his mouth, but Vlad rushes on.

"You know Ingrid told me to stay away from you?"

And then he stands up. And he's pacing again, agitated.

"Always right; she just  _ has _ to be right. She said, you'll catch feelings again and then you'll be sorry. Well, I am, Robin! I decided just once to check up on you, after Jonno came back and told me you were a mess – "

" _ Jonno _ Van Helsing?"

"Then I couldn't stop." He's gesturing with his hands as he speaks. Shouts. Robin would be afraid of his flatmates overhearing if he wasn't suspended with disbelief. "Once a month, once a week,  _ twice _ a week. Every night. And then I got myself caught by Sarah, of all people, and she wouldn't let me leave alone. I came to the party; I shook your hand."

"It's the only thing I've looked forward to," says Robin.

"I shoulda known you wouldn't ignore it."

"Ignore  _ what _ ? The fact you've got this fuckin' power? Know everythin' about my life when I 'aven't a clue?"

"Yes!" says Vlad.

There's a flurry of fire from the tips of his fingers. Vlad snatches his hand back to his chest.

"If you've been there," says Robin, feeling his heart beat an unnatural rhythm against his ribs, "then you know. If you missed me, great. But that isn't fair."

"I let myself down," Vlad tells him. He's quiet again now and flexing his fingers into his palm. "Being with you's like being a kid again. Can't even control the basics. I know how much has gone wrong but I don't wanna lose you."

"You're makin' me choose?" asks Robin.

"There are too many vampires who can use your memories against you," says Vlad, and this time Robin knows he isn’t joking. His nostrils flare and panic flashes in his eyes. "You don’t know what would happen if the wrong sort of vampire got hold of a breather – a person – like you! To use you against me. I’m too high profile and you’re too important."

"I haven’t felt it," says Robin. "Not for… I’d say years, but I can’t remember, that’s the problem."

"I can fix it," says Vlad, "but I'd never see you again."

"I don’t see the difference."

"Robin," Vlad groans, "you only know what I want you to know.  _ That’s _ the difference. If I remove the mind-wipe, you’ll have everything and it's  _ dangerous _ . Any more is signing your death warrant."

"They might never find me… I’ll be hard to track down."

"It took me three days."

Robin looks away. Couldn't life have the decency just the once to throw something without complications in his direction? Two months ago, he thought he would have dropped everything on the spot for a chance at regaining the lost years of his life, but now he's arguing the toss over whether the past for the present is a fair trade with a boy who claims to be a vampire.

Is a vampire.

Whatever.

He doesn't have a reflection or a pulse and he's cold as the winter. He's handsome and stylish and has a smile that radiates the warmth of the sun.

"You've got to understand," says Vlad carefully, finally coming to a stop in the middle of the room, "who I am, what I do, is hanging by a thread. I know we can make something work like this, just as we are. But if we drag up any more of the past, if I take away the mind-wipe and then someone finds you... It's everything; my life and yours."

Is it too soon for another cigarette? wonders Robin.

He pulls at a loose stitch in the leg of his jeans and swallows down his complaints. He doesn't understand. He wishes he'd retained more information about Vampire Lore and had even half a clue about Vlad's responsibilities within his own world, amongst his own people. He's torn, without a solution, and the feeling is worsened as the wine-red of Vlad's shirt appears in Robin's peripheral.

"I'm asking..." says Vlad, "what's more important? Right here right now, or who we used to be?"


	6. Who Wants To Live Forever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is the song by Queen, however in this context it's the Vitamin String Quartet cover.

Six months pass and Robin doesn’t see head nor hair of Vlad, as he'd promised. In the beginning, he still lies awake in bed at night. He keeps the nightlight turned on. He buys another bottle of scotch and begins to create a timeline, at the back of his sketchpad, detailing the events of his life.

There's a subtle reprise in the inclusion of Vlad's name.

Robin manages to sketch out the entirety of the Dracula family, with his expensive new drawing inks, in such startling detail it's a shock even to him. He only wishes he could show it to the one person who was no longer around.

"I thought he was into you, too," says Veronica, with an unfortunate shrug, when Robin finally gathers the courage to tell her that Vlad won't be helping with the cleaning anymore.

Robin shrugs as if it's nothing.

"Wrong place, wrong time," he tells Veronica.

But all the same, he declines her multiple offers of setting him up with any number of her new friends from the Amateur Theatrics society.

Spring arrives, as does Robin's birthday and he's turning 21.

He thinks at the very least he'll receive a birthday card from Vlad, who had sworn that he'd never forgotten the date, even when his thoughts were swimming with official Council business and family drama and notwithstanding the one time in his life he'd been labelled as "bad", shortly after his transformation.

Nothing turns up. Robin calls the post office in case it's gone astray, but the lady on the phone sighs an apology into his ear and Robin hangs up the phone.

Then it’s June, and Robin is packing up his things and leaving for the summer. It's July, and he’s researching topics for his third-year dissertation, the draft of which is due in the early autumn, but he has a pretty good idea. Roland Barthes wrote an entire book on memory, and capturing it, and Sontag too had some pretty good essays. They’re providing comfort for Robin in the aftermath. He takes a leap of faith one evening and turns off the lamp when he settles into bed, enveloped immediately in the darkness. He waits for the sudden terror that's sure to follow.

But it doesn't.

When Robin glances in the direction of the coat rack in the corner of his room, he no longer sees the figure of a twisted man. Instead, plain and simple, his collection of jackets and scarves huddle together in the shadows.

Everything seems to have happened back to front. With a knowledge of the past, Robin should undoubtedly have been more afraid, but that isn't the case. He takes another walk up to the castle the following day, sunshine bearing down on his shoulders, sweat on his brow, and sits to sketch the vivid new memory of the Dracula's entrance hall.

Chloe likes to remind him periodically that she's happy to see her brother coming out of his shell. Robin thinks he knows what that means. Ian and Paul finally take him on a night out that, unfortunately for Robin, ends at a gay bar. He gets the last laugh when his mam, disorientated at 3 am, comes bursting into the front room in her nightdress to break up the impromptu after-party, to which Ian has invited a pretty girl.

Turns out to be a drag queen but to be fair, even Robin hadn't immediately clocked on.

"Crazy, what you can do wi' make-up, ey?" says Paul, the next morning, jovial despite the hangover and their mam's tired-eyed glower across the kitchen.

For the most part, Robin dives into study. When the end of year results only seem to spell disaster, he pulls himself together; takes a couple of online courses and actually puts his talents to use, instead of squandering his skills, his passions and abilities.

It’s freeing to remember.

It’s strange to be the person to fill Mam and Dad in on the details of his life that, for them, were still missing.

Stranger still are the memories of who Robin used to be, in full, as opposed to the snippets he siphoned from Uncle Bryn at family gatherings. For years, Robin has been striving to emulate the person he thinks he should remember, but now he's bombarded by recollections of the stronger and more vibrant personality of his younger self. Robin remembers being fearless and cocksure as a teenager, declaring boldly as to how lucky anyone would be to go out with him, and he tries his best to come to terms with it. His new personality doesn’t resemble the old but they coexist for a while, settling eventually. He attempts to imitate the feelings as he looks at himself in the mirror, twisting this way and that, practising poses.

Ian catches him one day, stares and begins to laugh. Robin decides to grow facial hair instead but it’s testament to his recovering confidence that he’s able to roll his eyes and grin when Ian recounts the story over dinner.

"Well, he's very handsome!" says Elizabeth. "Just like his dad."

And slowly Robin begins to realise that he's more content than he's been in a long while. He wishes, nevertheless, that he harboured enough power to change the ending of his story. If his life were a tv show, he thinks, a movie or, hell, even a self-gratifying fanfiction written by one of those weird women on the internet, he knows for sure that Vlad would have swooped in by now with his apologies, promises of love and adoration, for all the years to come.

Would it be crazy, Robin wonders, to write the story for himself?

He pens a letter to Vlad instead and leaves it on the windowsill. It isn't picked up for days and days, as the sun burns ever hotter and August melts in around Stokely. His mam asks if she should throw it away, but Robin says no.

Leave it there.

If ever Vlad returns, he'll know how Robin feels.

One particular evening, Robin is copying quotes out of his liberally inked and page-marked textbook. The night has truly settled outside the window and the warm summer air is floating through the gap in the curtains. Robin pulls away from his laptop screen, pausing to rub at his eyes, when from downstairs – a knock at the front door.

"It’s ten-thirty!" exclaims Graham, his voice drifting over the sound of the television.

This time, thinks Robin. He never stops hoping. He’s quick to his feet and down the stairs, shouting,

"I got it!"

before his dad can get out of his seat.

The visitor behind the door isn’t Vlad at all, of course, but rather a young woman. She’s dressed in colourful Harem pants, with pale skin and long brown hair. There are streams of beaded necklaces around her throat and there, nestled between them, the Dracula coat of arms. She's definitely very pretty and Robin realises slowly, and then all at once, that he's staring another vampire dead in the face.

“Robin Branagh?” the woman asks, holding her hand out to shake with a cheery smile. “I'm Talitha. Can we have a chat?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can make up your own minds about where this conversation is heading, but I'm content in saying that I don't really think Vlad and Robin's story will truly ever end.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for any views, kudos, comments etc. Every so often I get kudos on old fics from years ago and it makes me so happy that there are still people out there that, like me, just can't leave this fandom alone!
> 
> If you've never read any of my work before, you should know that I love a good playlist and so as usual I've made one (or two) for this fic. Welcome to having depression throughout all three years of university and damaging your chances of success because you just can't get a grip of yourself: [Robin](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3iyLJupKug63BQpcZFWQdI?si=gRTwVRHRQAO5d6HBYakZig) // [And Vlad](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4TRKDoTHUiyDE0ht6zlk65?si=cF_MMtj-SLCRYFkAFOgXug)


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